Pens Edge Caps, 2-1

When the Caps and Penguins are on the schedule, the game is almost always worth the price of admission and then some. Wednesday night's game in Washington between the two bitter Metropolitan Division rivals was no exception; it was a hard fought and contentious game on both sides. But at night's end, it was the Penguins who skated off with a pair of points via a 2-1 shaving of the Capitals.

Washington entered Wednesday's game with 12 wins in its previous 14 games, and with at least three goals for in all 14 of those contests, the team's longest streak of its kind in nearly a decade. The Caps generated enough chances to score three or more goals on Wednesday, but a combination of a lack of finish, some bad luck and a couple of good stops from Pittsburgh goalie Matt Murray conspired to limit them to a single goal, halting Washington's five-game winning streak as well.

Bryan Rust, who couldn't buy a goal for the first quarter of the season, scored a pinball goal with 1:02 left in the second period to snap a 1-1 tie. Rust's goal - his seventh of the season, but his sixth in five games - proved to be the game-winner when the Caps weren't able to manufacture an equalizer despite several good chances to do so.
"I think we created more than enough chances to score a couple of goals more," says Caps center Lars Eller, who scored Washington's lone goal. "We did a lot of good things, just a couple of saves on the goal lines and off of posts and stuff, so it was just one of those days."
Caps winger Tom Wilson didn't play in the first two games between Washington and Pittsburgh this season, so Wednesday's game was his first against the Pens since the hit he laid on Pens forward Zach Aston-Reese in Game 3 of the second-round playoff series between the two teams last spring. Wilson was suspended for three games for that hit, and Aston-Reese was lost to the Pens because of a broken jaw sustained on the play.
The Pittsburgh papers carried some speculation of possible Pens retribution for Wilson this week, but that's not how it played out. Pens GM Jim
Rutherford excoriated Wilson in the press
last May for what he termed Wilson's unwillingness to fight Pens defenseman Jamie Oleksiak in the aftermath of the hit on Wilson.
Wilson and Oleksiak had that long-awaited scrap in the first minute of Wednesday's game, and it certainly didn't go down the way Rutherford hoped. Wilson dropped the 6-foot-7, 255-pound defenseman with a hard right to the face, ending Oleksiak's night after all of nine seconds worth of ice time and leaving the Pens with five defensemen the rest of the way.

"I think both parties knew," says Wilson. "I read the stuff that's said after last season, leading up to it. I think it probably had to be done sooner or later, give him a chance to defend his teammate for what happened last year. Obviously you never want to see a guy go down like that, but that's hockey. I respect him as a player, and it's unfortunate to see that."
There was no word on Oleksiak's condition after the game.
Minutes later, tempers flared again between Caps captain Alex Ovechkin and Pens defenseman Kris Letang, and both players were sent off for matching roughing minors. Five minutes in, it seemed like the lid might boil right off the pot, but the two sides settled in and played a good hockey game thereafter.
Neither side scored in the first, though the Pens had a pair of power play opportunities. All three goals were scored in the second period. Washington wasn't able to do anything with a pair of early power play opportunities in the middle frame, but the Caps were able to get on the board first, doing so shortly after the second of those extra-man chances went by the wayside.
Matt Niskanen put a hit on Pittsburgh's Jake Guentzel near the Washington line, jarring the puck loose for Wilson. Wilson feathered a touch pass to spring Eller into Pittsburgh ice, and the Caps center beat Murray to make it 1-0 for Washington at 6:38 of the second.
The lead was short-lived. With the Penguins on a power play less than three minutes later, the visitors pulled even. From the top of the paint, Sidney Crosby deflected Letang's center point shot past Braden Holtby, making it a 1-1 game at 9:15.
Washington had some glorious chances to retake the lead late in the second, but Jakub Vrana rang iron off a semi-breakaway bid, and Ovechkin just missed the net on a one-timer from the slot.
Those lost opportunities came back to haunt the Caps when Washington was unable to tame or freeze a bouncing puck on a goalmouth scramble late in the second. With the puck bounding around the crease and with bodies flying about as well, Pittsburgh got a bounce when the puck bounded off of Rust and into the net at 18:58.

Twice in the third period, the Caps got a puck through Murray, but they weren't able to light the lamp. Evgeny Kuznetsov's shot got through and wobbled harmlessly off the far post, and minutes later Pens defenseman Marcus Pettersson sprawled out in full extension to sweep Eller's bid for a second goal right off the line.
At the other end of the ice, Holtby kept the Caps close with big stops on Evgeni Malkin and Derrick Brassard. But the Caps just couldn't get one to go in, and they went 0-for-5 on the power play as well. The Caps managed six shots on net with the extra man, but the Pens had as many while shorthanded.
Pettersson's clutch crease sweep likely cost the Caps a point in the end.
"I thought we played really hard," says Pens coach Mike Sullivan. "I give our guys a lot of credit. Washington obviously is a good team, and it was a hard fought battle. I thought we found a way. It started with our goaltender and it worked out from there, but I thought it was a solid effort by everybody."
"We've been able to win a lot of games out of the last 14, 15," says Caps coach Todd Reirden. "And tonight we ended up on the losing end. We'll be back at it on Friday."